


Silence

by Phoenixflames12



Category: Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Gen, Gotham's Writing Workshop, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-29 05:40:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16257791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phoenixflames12/pseuds/Phoenixflames12
Summary: October, 1718A young Jocasta Mackenzie reflects on her relationship with Ellen and where she stands at a Leoch without the presence of her older sister





	Silence

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the recent featurette for Outlander Season 4 on Jocasta, I decided to try and explore who she was before her marriages and her relationship with her older sister, Ellen

**October 1718**

The silence was perfect.

 

The moorland stretches out before her in a great autumnal tapestry of green and brown and gold that weaves its’ way up to the craggy pile that is Leoch staring out over the glen.

 

It is a pile of stones and little else to her now, with the loss of her sister to the hands of Brian _Dhu_ and the wilds of Lallybroch.

 

A pile of stones that echo with the ripple of Ellen’s laughter, of her brothers and their constant squabbling that is now little more than a memory with Colum’s body maimed beyond repair, closeted away in his chambers with his books and the healers who, despite all their best efforts, cannot seem to make him whole again.

 

Ellen could, she knows that.

 

She could because out of all of them, it was Ellen who knew how to make Colum laugh, with an easy, breathless, beautiful sound that Jocasta loved before all things.

 

Ellen had laughed like that on the night before the gathering, she remembers now.

 

It had been a laughter that had spoken of things that she did not understand. 

 

Things that were hidden from her by the great expanse of childhood that still stretches out before her that her sister has crossed for good, never to return.

 

‘ _Ye’ll learn about it someday, a phiuthar,’_ she had murmured when Jocasta had come to her one night, woken by the thud of bedsprings and the barely concealed gasps for breath that had bubbled into husky laughter through the bedroom walls. Her sister’s door had been left ajar, the mattress still warm with unknown heat, a candle guttering on the windowsill.

 

‘ _An’ tae tell ye the truth, it’s no’ better than what the bull does when he sees a kine on heat, ye ken?’_

 

And Ellen had smiled a hateful, secretive smile, her eyes glittering maddeningly as she had tucked an escaped curl back behind Jocasta’s ear, brushing her lips in a soft, breath of a kiss against her sister’s cheek.

 

Overhead the long, mournful cry of a curlew sweeps across the soft, grey sky, the shadows long and dusky as they spin out over the glen.

 

Her skirt fans out around her, the hem sodden with mud and grass stains, the remnants of a forgotten daisy chain lying limp in her lap.

 

Somewhere amongst the coarse stubble of heather, bracken and broon, she can hear one of the dogs stalking for grouse, the crack of leaf litter loud in the stillness.

 

Ellen would often take her up here with their easels and paper to sketch the landscape, the shifting colours and tones of the season caught in the swipe of a pencil or the smudge of charcoal as the thunderheads boiled over the glen. These excursions would often descend into discarding their drawing materials and making daisy chains and flower crowns of primroses and harebells whilst Jocasta filled Ellen in on snippets of servants’ gossip that she had snuck out from the kitchen.

 

Those days are gone now, no matter how much she wants them back.

 

Gone in the heat of the gathering, gone in Brian _Dhu’s_ gleaming dark eyes as they had appraised her sister over his wine glass across the top table, sat at the right hand of their father as befitted a guest of honour.

 

Gone in the faint clattering of horses’ hooves that had thudded through her dreams that night as the visiting party had clattered out of the kailyard and which she, foolish child that she had been, had thought nothing of.

 

Instead of rushing to the window and crying out her farewell, or better still, trying to stop them with all the might that her eleven-year-old self could muster, she had rolled over in bed and tried to capture her ever elusive sleep, oblivious to all but the hush of her own breathing.

 

Those days are gone now and Ellen; dear, sweet Ellen with her sharp Mackenzie eyes that could cut through men like they were sheathes of corn, but were always softened for her, has gone with them.

 

Smoothing down her skirts, she watches the soft, dead petals of her daisy chain tumble back into the grass and, readjusting the clasp of her cloak, whistles for the dog.

 

* * *

 

_**Fin** _

**Author's Note:**

> Please feel free to read and review!
> 
> Comments, suggestions, constructive criticism etc are like chocolate to my brain!
> 
> Much love,
> 
> Phoenixflames12 xxx


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